Pour some (maple) sugar on me: Ben & Jerry's maple walnut ice cream

In Maine, where I grew up, March is the season for maple sugaring--a process I first witnessed during a fourth-grade field trip to a working historic homestead. We got a chance to check the taps and look in on the sugaring shack (after we did a little 1800s-era housework, like sweeping while wearing ruffled bonnets and emptying a few too-realistic-for-comfort chamberpots).

I don't currently have access to maple taps (or, thankfully, chamberpots) but I do keep plenty of syrup on hand. We are not an Aunt Jemima kind of household.

And I firmly believe that syrup is for more than just pancakes. That's why I was happy to test out a maple walnut ice cream recipe from two fellow New Englanders I call Ben and Jerry. Which is what everyone else calls them, too.

They recommend using Grade C syrup for this, which has a sharper maple flavor and is for cooking and baking, not table use. I used Grade A and lived to tell the story. I have a feeling Grade C is a little tougher to find than the lighter Grade A. If you've found it and used it, I'd love to hear what you think.

Most of Ben and Jerry's ice cream recipes start with a sweet cream base (and they suggest three ways to make it). I used a base made with raw eggs. If that weirds you out, you can also make a base by blending 2 cups of light cream with 1 cup of cold sweetened condensed milk.

Maple Walnut Ice Cream
Source: Ben & Jerry's Homemade Ice Cream & Dessert Book

•  2 eggs
• 3/4 c. sugar
• 2 c. heavy cream
• 1 c. milk
• 1/4 c. maple syrup
• 1/2. chopped walnuts

Whisk the eggs until light and fluffy (about 2 minutes). Gradually whisk in the sugar until completely blended, then mix in the cream and milk. Gradually add the maple syrup until blended.

Transfer the mixture to your ice cream maker and freeze according to manufacturer's instructions.

Just before the ice cream finishes freezing, add walnuts. Transfer to a plastic container and put in the freezer until firm.

The recipe makes a little more than a quart (or about 50 spoonfuls straight from the freezer, which is my preferred method of serving and consuming).


The food: Maple walnut ice cream
The verdict: Worth doing 1800s-era housework for

Marshmallow Fluff: The Cupcake Baker's Best Friend

I love a good cupcake.  But more than a good cupcake, I love a good frosting.  I spend a lot of time over at Cupcakes Take the Cake, admiring the professional decorating jobs, wishing I could get my frosting to pile on fluffy and thick like they do.  I have a couple of tried-and-true recipes, but while they taste good, they don't have much body to them, so big, puffy piles of piped-on frosting just don't happen for me.

Until now.  I think I've discovered a frosting hack.

And it's Marshmallow Fluff.

I had half of a container left over from Christmas fudge making and I needed to use it up, so I combined about 8 oz. of Fluff with about 3/4 c. softened butter and added powdered sugar and vanilla to taste (probably about 1/2 to 3/4 c. sugar and a 1/2 t. of vanilla) and mixed with my faithful KitchenAid stand mixer.  It was good!  Rich and not too sugary.  But more than that, it was really fluffy and I could spread and pipe to my heart's content.  I'd say it made enough to frost 18-24 cupcakes, depending on how generous you're feeling.

I think the Marshmallow Fluff brand of marshmallow creme is made in Massachusetts, so maybe it's more of a regional treat, because I had a tough time finding it here in North Carolina.  In Maine, I remember flavored Fluff -- raspberry and strawberry, I think.  I'd love to get my hands on that for frosting purposes.  In the meantime, I think I'll experiment with orange extract.

Let's hear it for Fluff, the baker's best friend.

Getting Fresh: Apple Cake

Raleigh is a lovely place, but it's not known for its apple orchards, so they truck them in from other places, like Michigan and Pennsylvania.  You know those Pace commercials where the cowboys have near-coronaries after they discover their salsa is made in New York City?  That's how I feel about the apples I get here.  I'm sure they're swell and all, but I like Maine apples and that's that.  Mom, if you're reading this, send me a peck or two, would you?

Maybe my apple bias is why I wasn't all that thrilled with my latest attempt in the kitchen, Fresh Apple Cake.

I can't blame the recipe source: the King Arthur blog.  Those bakers know what they are doing for sure.  I think it was probably me.  I used too small a pan.  I overbaked.  My apples weren't cut uniformly.  I substituted apple juice concentrate for the boiled cider.  And there just wasn't all the apple goodness I was hoping for.

That being said, I think I should give it another try.  Everyone seemed to have great success with it except for me.  Any suggestions on perking it up a little?

Hammy Sammies. On Biscuits.

Sue and Peter came to visit us from Maine this weekend.  In addition to a little Old North State down-home cooking at Raleigh's The Pit, we wanted to treat them to some North Carolina-inspired fare at our place.  Given the popularity of pork here, I decided on deviled ham sandwiches (made in Maine favorite Bakewell biscuits for a reminder of home as they're on the road).

The deviled ham recipe is from a recent issue of Gourmet magazine (RIP).  One-and-a-half cups of cooked, chopped ham, one-third of a cup of mayo, a tablespoon or so of grainy mustard, a few splashes of Worcestershire sauce and a little bit of Tabasco.  Mix and serve.

The biscuits were good, but overpowered the ham a little.  Next time, I think good old white bread will be in order.

The food: Deviled ham biscuit sandwiches
The verdict: The ham stole the show

Coffee Cans Make Good Bread Pans

This being Labor Day weekend, I'm bidding adieu to another summer -- a little sad, since I'm so fond of the season.

When I was a kid, summer was pretty much awesome overload. My birthday is in the summer. School's out. The days are long and warm. And then there was our annual Fourth of July trip to Madawaska Lake to see my aunt Sandy and cousin Kate.

My family really loves tradition, so the routine was pretty much the same every time we came: float around the lake in inner tubes, stage a patriotic play (I penned it myself -- let me know if you'd like to purchase the performance rights), make a daily candy trip to Stan's, attempt to spot Susan Collins, whose family lived next door. We also spent a lot of time eating, because we love food and because Sandy is a great cook.

There were two foods we could always count on: Mrs. Dunster's Donuts (Canada's finest export) and oatmeal spoon bread, which is mixed in large batches and baked in coffee cans, then toasted and buttered.

I like most types of oatmeal bread that I've tried, but there is something extra good about this one. The molasses are the secret ingredient.

You can also bake this in regular old bread pans (especially since metal coffee cans are tough to come by these days -- I know, because I got tricked into buying several plastic impostors), but the cans make one awesome round loaf of bread.

I generally think of this bread as a breakfast food, but I made a BLT with it the other day and Ben dips his in corn chowder, so we can attest that its deliciousness knows no meal-specific bounds. Eat it 'round the clock, if you like. And I think you will like.


Oatmeal Spoon Bread (from my aunt Sandy, who got it from my grandmother)

• 2 c. quick-cook oatmeal
• 3 c. boiling water
• 2 T. butter
• 2 T. salt
• 3/4 c. sugar
• 1/2 c. molasses
• 1 c. whole milk
• 2 pkgs. yeast
• 1/2 c. water, warm
  
• 10 c. flour
  

Combine first seven ingredients (through the milk). Meanwhile, proof the yeast in the 1/2 c. of warm water. Allow the oatmeal mixture to cool (enough so it doesn't kill the yeast), then add the proofed yeast.

In a stand mixer with a bread hook, mix in the flour, five cups at a time. Cover and let rise until doubled. Once it has doubled, punch down and divide into seven equal lumps. Put dough into seven well-greased coffee cans. (Metal, not plastic, but I'm sure you assumed that.) The dough will be pretty wet (and I'm guessing that's why they call it spoon bread).

Cover the cans and allow to rise until the dough reaches close to the top of the can -- 30 to 45 minutes. Bake on the lower rack of the oven at 350 degrees for 35 to 45 minutes. Place foil over the tops of the cans if the bread crust begins to look too dark. Cool on racks, shake out of the cans and serve.


The food: Oatmeal Spoon Bread
The verdict: I'd rather eat this than donuts (no offense, Mrs. Dunster)

Merry Christmas to Me

This is me at Christmas, about to enjoy a whole pile of one of my favorite (and Oprah's favorite) desserts: Wicked Whoopies.

Ben and I went straight to the Isamax bakery to pick up a dozen. Unfortunately, they were closed early for Christmas Eve. Fortunately, my sister made it there before they closed and picked up all my favorites: strawberry, raspberry and cream, and peanut butter.



See all that raspberry goodness?

I'd like to take this opportunity to offer a formal word of thanks to my sister for her whoopie pie foresight. Whoopie pies, it would have been a blue Christmas without you.

The Good. And the Bad and Ugly.

Thanksgiving. A day for giving thanks. But mostly for cooking. And eating. And then eating leftovers.

This was our second Thanksgiving in North Carolina and while we briefly entertained the idea of making barbecue for the big meal, we went traditional in the end. In my post-Thanksgiving review and analysis, I give a thumbs-up to the turkey (made in my slow cooker), the cranberry sauce (made in a factory by Ocean Spray) and the biscuits (which were both a Thanksgiving side and breakfast today, served with gravy).



The secret to the biscuits is Maine's own Bakewell Cream. I haven't found it around here, but if you're into making biscuits, it's well worth a mail order. The leavening agent makes biscuits flaky and fluffy (unless you're a compulsive mixer or kneader, which I used to be -- and in that case, even the magic of Bakewell Cream can't save you). The moral of the story: Mix minimally. Knead lightly. Use Bakewell.

The day, however, was not without its disappointments. The biggest disappointment: Rachael Ray's Double-Decker Pumpkin-Caramel Pie.

Check out this link to see what Everyday with Rachael Ray promised me it would look like. Here's what it actually looked like:



I swear, there's a slice of pie under there.

This flop was particularly painful since dessert is the best part of Thanksgiving and pumpkin pie is the best dessert.

There were three main problems. First, I couldn't find the chocolate graham crackers for the crust, so I improvised with Oreos. Sounds good in theory, but they stayed in the pie plate. Second, the pie batter was a little on the bitter side, so I added a little (lot) more sugar. The pie never really set right. Third, the caramel whipped cream was made by melting caramel with cream, then adding the mixture to cream whipped to soft peaks. The caramel deflated the cream and turned the whole thing into a soupy, yucky-sweet mess.

Despite the obvious visual evidence that I had failed, I grabbed a spoon and tried a slice. This, after all, was Thanksgiving, and I needed some pie. It wasn't pretty.

Next year, it's back to regular old pumpkin pie. Hold the caramel.

True Blue

There are plenty of things I like about living in the South, but one thing that really riles me up, culinarily speaking, is the lack of blueberries. Or, more specifically, the lack of good blueberries. All I can get are the highbush, puffy, tasteless blueberries that grow in New Jersey. No offense to any New Jersey readers, or those who dig New Jersey's brand of berry, but people -- these are just poor imitations of the tart little lowbush guys we grow in Maine.



But fear not. My mom -- partly because she loves me and partly because she's tired of hearing me whine about my blueberry situation -- gave me two cans of "the caviar of Maine" for my birthday. I saved them for a while before I found a recipe worthy of them. I ended up making a very yummy batch of muffins. Which I mostly ate by myself.




The food: Maine lowbush blueberries
The verdict: The way blueberries should be

My Mom's Pumpkin Bread

When Ben had his wisdom teeth out a few days ago, he went on a milkshake-and-mashed-potatoes diet. But when he was feeling more up to chewing, I baked two loaves of my mom's excellent pumpkin bread -- a New England favorite perfect for those recovering from oral surgery. And anyone else, too.

I highly recommend this recipe. Very dense and really good with milk. If you underbake it just a bit, you get a little bit of a gooey spot on the top of the bread in the center. That's my favorite part. The bread also freezes really well, so you can eat one loaf now and save the other one for later.

Abbie's Mom's Pumpkin Bread

• 1 (15-oz.) can pumpkin (I like One-Pie, but I have to settle for Libby's down here in the South; make sure to use pure pumpkin, not a pumpkin pie mix)
  
• 4 eggs
• 1 cup vegetable oil
• 2/3 cup water
• 3 cups granulated sugar
• 3-1/2 cups all-purpose flour
• 2 teaspoons baking soda
• 1-1/2 teaspoons salt
• 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 2 teaspoons pumpkin pie spice (a mix of nutmeg, cloves and ginger if you want to throw it together yourself; some people add cinnamon or allspice)
  

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Grease two 9x5 loaf pans.

Mix together pumpkin, eggs, oil, water and sugar. In a second bowl, whisk together the remaining dry ingredients; add to pumpkin mixture and stir until just blended.

Pour batter into pans. Bake for 60-70 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean.

The food: Pumpkin bread
The verdict: Gourds never tasted so good!

Whoopie! Pies

I guess you can get whoopie pies in other places, but I always think of them as a Maine specialty. And while I like whoopies of all kinds, my absolute favorite pies come from Maine bakery Isamax, maker of The Wicked Whoopie. (That's a half-eaten Wicked Whoopie pie above, held by my sister Allie, who is also a W.W. fan.) They're soft, they're creamy, they're messy. They're amazing.

I like all of the Isamax flavors, but I have a few top picks: Chocolate Chip, Pumpkin, Strawberry, and my very favorite, Raspberry & Cream, which is golden cake with traditional filling and a dollop of raspberry preserves. Last year, my family was kind enough to send me two raspberry pies and two chocolate chip pies for my birthday. I think at least one was for Ben but I beat him to it.

If you think Wicked Whoopies sound familiar, it could be because they've been featured on the Oprah Winfrey show (and a lot of other places, including The Food Network and QVC).

Oprah digs them. I dig them. I think you'll dig them.

The food: Wicked Whoopies
The verdict: The world's perfect dessert

The Maine Dish

This past weekend, Ben and I drove home for Annie's high school graduation. While we were there, I went with Allie (who, very bravely, is a first grade teacher) to be her grown-up helper for Forestry Day, which is a day where you and a bunch of small children tromp around the woods.

For lunch, Allie and I stopped at the market that used to be Emery's (which used to be Dowe's) on Route 32 in South China to pick up the ultimate field trip food -- Italians.

Perhaps you've heard of the Italian. Anywhere else you can get hoagies or subs or similar impostors, but you can only get an Italian in Maine. (And you know it's true because Wikipedia says so.) Here's what makes an Italian an Italian:

• Made in a soft, oversized New England hotdog bun (which are baked side-by-side so that there is a crust only on the top)
• Contains ham (from the deli, sliced pretty thick), white American cheese, green peppers, onions (usually diced), black olives, pickles and tomatoes
• Dressed with oil (I'm not a purist, so I use mayo)

I really love Italians -- they're one of the foods I miss most now that we're in North Carolina. Sometimes I make them myself, but they're just not as good as the ones that I get, say, at Whipper's on Bangor Street in Augusta (and which isn't just an Italian shop, but a car wash as well). I'm thinking about having a few packed in dry ice and expressed to the Tar Heel State. A little taste of heaven. On a hotdog bun.

The food: Emery's large ham Italian, minus the tomato, with mayo
The verdict: Any Italian is a good Italian; next time I'll ask for extra pickles

NEXT POST, look out for a second Maine favorite: whoopie pies!